MacCallister hires the team to investigate a series of terrorist acts that have been happening in the Orc Underground. While they are at the meet, he gets a call that a school has been bombed, killing or injuring a the orc children, and he sends the team to the nearest entrance to investigate. The team offers some help to a construction crew, who are not being permitted into the entrance (hidden in a parking garage) because the parking garage is structurally unsound and the crew doesn’t have the appropriate permits. Mal convinces the cops guarding the area that the team is the CSI unit, calling in a favor from Tosh in order to provide “verification”, and brings the construction crew in with them. Arriving at the school, the sight is shocking. There are tiny orc bodies everywhere, and members of the Skatcha are keeping the crowd back while volunteers search the rubble for any surviving kids. Several party members are overcome with shock, however Parker searches astrally for survivors (finding none) and begins healing the surviving kids. Once the team recovers from the horror of the scene, they discover that both of the news moguls, Joe and Athena, beat them to the scene – a fact verified by the Skatcha and the witnesses. In fact, the news moguls were both on the scene suspiciously quickly. After being contacted for information, both Joe and Athena offer help in exchange for an exclusive on the investigation. The team selects Joe, who tells them his tipster is someone they are familiar with – Captain Jack Turner, who the team captured for Dana Oaks, and is currently serving time in a Seattle jail. The team uses their KE connections to get an interview with Jack in jail, but he’s not willing to talk. He has already made a deal that allows him to stay in the local jail (a more pleasant alternative to being sent to prison, where he becomes the property of the corp running the prison), and sees no benefit from helping the team. The team threatens to leak information that he knows who the terrorists are to the Orc Underground, then uses their favor with Dana Oaks to have him released from jail. Captain Jack is more than happy to trade information for safety at that point, and tells the team about the courier routes that he set up for an unknown Mr. Johnson. After a few months, he realized that the events in the Orc Underground were consistently happening a day after his courier drop schedules, and contacted the media both to get some additional favors and as a way to provide a warning to the Orc Underground. He provides the team with his a copy of his courier routes. About this time, Dana Oaks contacts the team, telling them that they seem to be in the middle of something big, and it might be a good idea if they go to Las Vegas for a while to lay low. She’s obviously parroting a message from someone higher up, and adds “I expect you to follow this advice with the same diligence that you have shown my prior advice.” Which is to say, none at all. The team continues the investigation by planning an ambush at the next drop point. The couriers, a team of 5 women jacked into their bikes, put up a fight but are unwilling to leave fallen members behind. Parker levitates the package, a metal box, from the hand of one of the couriers, at which point they take the fallen comrades that they can get to and retreat fast. The team manages to take one fallen member, and Trixie follows the go-gangers as they retreat. Eventually, one of the uninjured go-gangers approaches Trixie and offers to trade information for her fallen wife, as well as offering a threat of revenge (from them or the Ancients) if her wife is killed. The team heals the wife, so that her condition is stable, and eventually agrees to the deal. The go-ganger warns the team about the box being trapped, and gives them one other critical piece of information — the location of the other drop point on this route. It is an abandoned factory on the border of Auburn and Tacoma. The team tries a sneaky approach at the factory, going in invisibly when possible, or disguised (the dragon hiding in an abandoned car shell). Most of the factory is empty, but eventually Parker (invisibly) overhears a conversation in a room ahead. Apparently one member of the team are unhappy with the latest turn of events, saying that the bomb was supposed to go off earlier, before the children were in the school, and is worried that this will bring too much heat. The team assaults the group, taking the opposing member captive, however they don’t get much information because they unintentionally set off the cranial bombs for the whole group. The only information that they get before getting spattered is that “Mr. White” hired them for the attacks in exchange for their freedom (all were previously in prison). So the team found the perps, but not the power behind them. They bring as much info as possible to MacCallister, who is grateful and pays them, as well as an exclusive (leaving out several details) to Joe Martin. Karma: 10, 12,000 payout.

Laurent Nazaire of the Atlantean Foundation hired the team to recover an artifact and codex held by a group of mages aligned with the Illuminates of the New Dawn, known as the Outer Order Circle, Capter 13, or OOCC13. Laurent does not know the location of the items, but has an “old friend” who does, who can be found somewhere in the Capital Hill area. After the meet, the team goes to Capital Hill, nicknamed “Catholic Hill” due to a heavy concentration of churches, and begins asking around for his friend – “Our Lady of Mercy”. They eventually track her down in an abandoned church where she has made her nest – she is a nosferatu who feeds off of the dying, or those who wish to die, in a nearby hospital. Once in the church, Our Lady hides from the team, and it takes some time before she drops the concealment spells protecting her, but eventually they work out a deal. Our Lady would like to feed off of someone who makes her “feel like a real woman” and so the team casts an illusion to make her appear attractive and then mind controls a “volunteer” into providing her with what she needs. After releasing the “volunteer” (who is rather tired by the feeding), she tells the group her story. She was a member of OOCC13, however her group tried to turn her in for a bounty after she turned. She escaped to the underground, and is convinced that they are still after her. Since then, she has nested in the church, feeds upon those who are dying or trying to die, and has become a protector of the squatters in the neighborhood. She knows all about the artifact – a horn, as well as the location of OOCC13’s lodge, which is in the forest outside the city. About this time, other interested parties contact the group. Moreau from the Drago Foundation wants a scanned copy of the codex, Lin Yao Chang, representing the Great Dragon Lung, offers a reward if the team makes the artifact and codex disappear, while Simon Andrews of Saeder Krupp offers a bounty for the head mage of the group. The team turns down Moreau and Lin Yao, but accepts Simon’s offer, since it doesn’t interfere witht he original job. The team has a really tough fight with the mercs and biodrone guards that OOCC13 has hired for protection while they do the ritual they have learned from the codex. Trixie almost dies, and several other team members are greatly injured. Nonetheless, the team eventually prevails, and they storm the cabin in the middle of the ritual. The mages have a hard time casting spells in the cabin, since it’s warded and the area is currently aspected toward those participating in the ritual, however that doesn’t stop bullets. The team interrupts the ritual and takes out the mages, except the head mage who they capture for Simon. The drops go smoothly and everyone gets paid. Karma: 8, 13,000 payout.

The team, along with Tosh’s strike force, successfully raided the Humanis compound and retrieved the target. They turned him in to Dana Oaks, which put them on the outs with Macallister, but they are now owed a favor by the ADA. 10 karma, 14,000 payout.

The team knocked out the maid on her way to work, and Parker went in disguised as the maid. Once in the house, the rest of the team came running in, while Parker knocked out the other maid. The study was searched, and the team found and removed the house server, but no sign of Matthias. Dana Oaks got a tip (no one knows who from) that the team is looking for a KE traitor, about the same time that the team found evidence of a snitch on Tosh’s team. The team agreed to share information with Dana Oaks for 7,000 each. Tosh’s team is assigned to help out the runners. The team found the snitch, and discovered that Matthias is hiding out with the Humanis in the Redmond Barrons. Tosh’s team and the runners are about to storm the compound.

The team got a call about a week later from Macallister, asking for a meet in the Gold Mine (Junior’s old bar) in the Ork Underground. When you get there, the place is bombed and Macallister is injured in the blast. The team pulls him out, Parker attempts some healing, Cutler does some first aid, but he still needs serious medical care. He briefly regains consciousness long enough to ask you to take him to Dr. What in the narrows, and then call Tosh. The team does this. Dr. What starts treating Macallister, and the team meets with Tosh. Macallister will be out a while, but Tosh negotiates on his behalf — Tosh and his team (as consultants, not cops) are going to investigate Mathers through their Knight Errant and legal channels, and the team will “investigate” on the other side of the law. Mal negotiates for a total of $13K each — Mathers is to be delivered alive & all evidence is to be turned over to Macallister and not released to the public. Parker & Chance scope the place out. There are 2 rooms inside shielded by something living (they are lined with magically active wood). Otherwise, no one in the house. The non-magical security looks tough. The team goes back to Mal’s place, so the mages can do an astral stakeout (taking turns since the max time to be astral is a couple of hours). The survellance revealed that the gardeners arrive at 8am and leave at 3pm; the maids arrive at 9 and leave at 6. Parker astrally follows the maid home, then physically breaks into the maid’s apartment, and duplicates the maid’s keycard.

The team seems to have settled on a plan where Parker uses her phantasm spell to look like the maid that she stole the keycard from, while some members of the team cause the maid a delay in getting to work (such as blasting her car with lightening breath on the way to work). That will get Parker into the house. Parker is then (theoretically) going to go straight to the warded room that is most likely to be an office, in order to find any evidence there, and hopefully Mathers himself. The backup plan is to rush the house, guns and explosives blazing, grab Mathers (if you find him), and get out in 1 minute or less, so that you can get away before KE arrives.

(Session 1: You were hired to find out who killed Macallister’s daughter. It looked like a Mayan Cutter serial killer hit, but turned out to be a copycat taking out O.R.C & metahuman rights activists. You found the guy, and discovered he was hired by Mathers, a middle manager for Knight Errant.)

You dropped off the Mayan Cutter with your buddy Macallister, who had a shaman also mind probe him and got basically the same info as Chance. A woman (probably his mom) then shot him in the temple, and Macallister paid you and bought drinks for everyone at the Rhino, in memory of his daughter.

The team survived the ambush – even Trixie, who saw her life flash before her eyes as that last bullet mysteriously missed, when it should have struck home (almost as if somewhere, an astral creature just spent some edge to keep her alive…) They checked out the cabin, and found an encrypted message from Fiona telling them that she thinks she was followed, so she booked to another safehouse to the West, in a little podunk town. The Drake finally gets the notes shoved under his door, and makes his way to the site. Spartacus patches up the rental as best he can in the short time, and everyone jumps in the truck to go to the next safehouse, except Parker and Drake, who fly there invisibly. The mages, now a little paranoid from the ambush, turn on their offensive spells full blast outside the town, and pretty much keep them going for the rest of the run.

The Sheriff hits them up with a “visitor’s tax” of 2,000 when they arrive, but otherwise lets them pass without any problem, despite their vehicle’s condition. Fiona is waiting for them, and offers them a bigger cut of the take if they can use their contacts to start a bidding war over the item. They negotiate 14%, but only if Mal does the negotiating for the deal. On the trip back to Seattle (once they reach communit range) Mal starts the calls, and the highest bidder is Lung’s representative, Lin Yao Chang (a male elf, not to be confused with Denver’s Lin Yao, the Tong leader, who is a human woman). They leave a message that Lung has won the bid, and get a text with their meet location.

They get back into the Barrons with the help of their coyote, and proceed to a location near the rental agency where they dump the truck. Cutler destroys evidence of that particular fake sin (it seems a fake sin is cheaper than a truck…) They then proceed to the meet site, but again being paranoid, the Drake and Parker take a fly-by. They notice some spirits hanging around the place and get suspicious. Mal calls Lin Yao, who is wondering where they are and is somewhat confused when Mal complains about too much security and about there being spirits. They reconfirm the meet location, which is a different warehouse entirely, and go to the real meet instead. (Mal’s communit was hacked by the Aleph hacker.) The exchange goes down just fine – Lin Yao recognizes the group as the ones who survived his ambush when trading the extracted researcher to the Atlantean Foundation – and they gain him as a contact (Loyalty 2). They payoff is $15,000 each, and 7 karma. Faction: Lung +1.

The team was contacted by Fiona, the archeologist (from SR04-00) who needs a ride back to Seattle from the foot of Mt. Rainer, along with her recent booty. Problem: the Aleph are also looking to get hold of Fiona and whatever she’s found. The team got to the coordinates sent by Fiona, and were promptly ambushed by the Aleph. The team took some heavy damage — Cutler and Trixie were shot up pretty bad. Cutler looks like he’ll pull though, but Trixie’s hanging on the verge of death.